Spiritual Confirmations

You know the feeling of entering a class unprepared?  That was me today in our little Danish class.  We have had two weeks since we met together, and we had considerable homework.  I should have gotten it done, but I kept putting it aside for other things and class arrived today before I realized it.

We each were supposed to write about the time we received our testimonies.

That is a difficult assignment even in English.  There wasn't a time...a moment.  It has been a lifetime of experiences with the Spirit...answers to prayers....insights as I read scriptures....an accumulation of small moments that have strengthened my spiritual self.

It was almost impossible for me in Danish....so I used Google Translate and did the best I could from there.  SK was not available at the time.

Mette, our teacher assigned us two pages of Pippi Longstockings (in Danish).  We were to read, study and translate it.  Alas, I waited til this morning to start on it.  The Parkers are still with us, and to tell you the truth we have way too much fun visiting.  A half hour before time to go, I sat down with SK and listened and took notes while he read aloud and translated for me.

In all fairness, I must tell you that even though this is a children's book, even SK has trouble with some of the vocabulary.  He reads through it and translates....and looks up words and then works at getting the meaning of the entire sentence.  So the whole process takes a fair amount of time...more than we had.  We got through a page and a half.

So.....in the Danish class...which is intense....and which lasts for 3 1/2 hours....we ended the time with Pippi.  Everyone was getting tired, and SK was sitting in the car outside waiting for me.  Mette asked who would like to begin....I immediately raised my hand because that is the part SK went over with me.  Unfortunately someone else beat me to it and I was the last to read.

I stumbled through it, and stumbled through the translation.  It was most disheartening.

On a much brighter note we went with the Parkers out to President Sederholm's house to eat dinner with all the senior missionaries in the area in honor of the new missionary couple who just arrived late last night....the Morgens from Idaho.  They are the third couple to serve here as Family Search missionaries....they will spend their days photographing old tomes containing birth, christening, baptism, wedding and death certificates, as well as census records etc.  They were suffering from jet lag, but were delightful company.  At the end of dinner, President Sederholm asked them to bear their testimonies.

Each bore a beautiful and inspiring testimony about Jesus Christ and about the Gospel.  Elder Morgan retired from the secret service after 40 years.  How fascinating is that?  Someone asked if it was an exciting job.  He said, "Go stand outside of any hotel for 4 hour s.  That is how exciting it is."

On a different note:  Monday night at Family Home Evening, we had an investigator who has been looking into the Church for many months.  She has been in her homeland of China for several weeks, and so hasn't been attending the center.

I was wearing the little key necklace which my young (15 years old) Chinese friend had made.  The YSA investigator admired it, and I told her very briefly why keys are meaningful to me.

She responded that she knew, because she heard the message I gave about gratitude last summer at the old center, that she still had the key (I had a small bowl of keys there for everyone to select from) and that it was hanging up where she saw it often.  She shared that when she gets discouraged about what isn't right in her life, the key reminds her to remember all of the things that are good.

I shouldn't ever whine to the Lord....It is a selfish thing to do....but that very morning I asked the Lord if I was doing OK and wondered if I had really done much of worth here in Denmark.

He was kind enough to answer through that young woman.  It warmed my heart....not only that my little FHE lesson meant something to her, but that the Lord was so kind as to answer my prayer so meaningfully for me.